Over recent years, there has been an increase in the exclusion of children from schools, which has prompted widespread concern and policy debate on how to prevent school exclusions. 

This is a serious concern given the tensions with children’s right to education, the lifelong harmful impacts of exclusion on children’s outcomes, as well as the societal costs involved. In the aftermath of the pandemic, which severely compromised children’s access to education, this panel brings together researchers and education professionals to question the ongoing issues regarding school exclusions, and the implications for governance, policy and practice.

Meet our speakers

Feyisa Demie is an Honorary Professor at Durham University School of Education and also head of research at Lambeth LA. He is a Fellow of the British Academies of Social Science (FAcSS). Feyisa has worked extensively with local authorities, government departments, the London Challenge,  individual schools, and school governors on the use of data and research to drive school improvement. He also runs school-focussed training programmes and national school improvement conferences for headteachers and teachers. With long-standing research interests in what works in raising achievement in schools and equity issues in education, he has written over 100 articles, book chapters, and research reports on school improvement, ethnicity,  disadvantage and educational inequality, social class, English as an additional language, school exclusions, diversity in the teaching workforce. Current research projects include barriers in the retention and recruitment of ethnic minority teachers, school exclusions, and tackling inequality. In 2023 Feyisa published the Routledge volume Understanding the Causes and Consequences of School Exclusions.

Mathew Purchase is a barrister at Matrix Chambers. He practices in education law, employment law, equality law, and public law. He was appointed Queen’s Counsel in 2021 and he was nominated for Employment Law Silk of the Year in the 2023 Legal 500 Bar Awards. He is recommended in Chambers and Partners and the Legal 500, which have described him as: ‘a brilliant and kind KC’, ‘excellent on every level’ and ‘exceptionally bright and fantastic to work with’. Together with Tom Ogg, Mathew is a barrister director of the School Exclusion Project, through which students at City University provide free representation in challenges to permanent exclusions from school.

Dan Rosenberg is a solicitor and partner in the public law department at Simpson Millar LLP. His work focuses on children’s rights, particularly in the sphere of education law. He seeks to use the law to enforce duties owed to children. He is a regular speaker on these issues, and has acted in a number of cases in the area covered by the national media. He has a particular interest not only in formal school exclusions, but also in challenging the myriad other ways that children are excluded from effective education, including through the use of isolation in schools. Much of his work deals with the consequences of the discrimination (primarily based on race/ disability) that unfortunately continues to pervade the education system. He was named Legal Aid Lawyer of the Year 2018 for his work in children’s rights by the Legal Aid Practitioners Group.

Kyann Zhang (@KyannZhang) has been a Research Fellow at LSE (CPEC) since 2021. She has been one of the lead researchers on the ESRC funded Excluded Lives project, exploring the economic impacts of school exclusions. Kyann’s main research interests focus on the economics surrounding mental health interventions,] outcomes, and their policy implications. Prior to joining CPEC, Kyann worked as an economist at the Office of Health Economics, where she conducted research and analysis on topics including innovative therapies, HTA methodology, and the application of cost-effectiveness thresholds in health care decision making. She has also contributed to the development of NICE guidelines as a health economist at the Royal College of Physicians. Kyann holds an MSc in International Health Policy (Health Economics) from LSE, and a Master of International and Development Economics from the Australian National University (ANU).

Meet our chair

Sonia Exley (@soniabean) is an Associate Professor in the Department of Social Policy at LSE. Her specialist area of research is education policy and she has published in a wide range of education and social policy journals.

More about this event

The Department of Social Policy (@LSESocialPolicy) provides top quality international and multidisciplinary research and teaching on social and public policy challenges facing countries across the world. From its foundation in 1912 it has carried out cutting edge research on core social problems and helped to develop policy solutions.

The Education Research and Policy Hub (EduHub) in the Department of Social Policy brings together permanent members of faculty, LSE Fellows, post-doctoral researchers and PhD students working on a broad range of educational issues. Coming from sociology, economics and political science among others, our interdisciplinary research covers early years, schools, vocational education and training, and higher education, in addition to cross-cutting issues, such as educational governance, inequalities (including SEN), and gender. 

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